Jamie Samuelsen, co-host of the “Jamie and Wojo” show at 6 p.m. weekdays on WXYT-FM (97.1), blogs for freep.com. His opinions do not necessarily reflect those of the Detroit Free Press nor its writers. You can reach him at jamsam22@gmail.com, follow him on Twitter @jamiesamuelsen and read more of his opinions at freep.com/jamie.

What do you take from the Lions’ 34-24 loss to the Vikings on Sunday? Have their playoff hopes all but vanished with the schedule getting tougher?

There are a thousand different ways to illustrate where the Lions find themselves after nine games of the season. But I think the most effective way of describing it is this:

The Saints and Cowboys are both having miserable years. The Saints have had to deal with the bounty turmoil. The Cowboys seem poised to fire head coach Jason Garrett after less than two seasons. And both those teams are ahead of the Lions in the quest for an NFC wildc-ard berth. Doesn’t that pretty much sum it up?

On NFL.com, there’s a section titled “Playoff Picture”. They list off ten teams for each conference. Six teams currently hold the playoff positions. And then there are four teams that are the seventh through tenth seeds in the race for the postseason. The Lions don’t even make the list of seven through ten. So any talk of the playoffs and the Lions fall into Jim Mora territory. “PLAYOFFS?”

I hate to be a hypocrite here seeing as I spent an entire post last week talking about the playoff possibilities following the 31-14 win over the Jaguars. It seemed like a long shot given the difficulty of the schedule heading down the stretch.

But given the level of competition, it also seemed like they had as good of a chance as anyone. Were the Lions any worse than the Seahawks who they beat head-to-head? Were they any worse than the Buccaneers? Were they any worse than the Vikings who entered Sunday’s game losers of three of four and playing without star receiver Percy Harvin?

Well, apparently we have our answer. They are worse than the Vikings. And anyone who tries to argue otherwise is fighting a losing argument. The Vikings are now two games above .500 and unbeaten (2-0) in the NFC North. The Lions lose the tiebreaker to the Vikes and remain winless in the division (0-3) with two games remaining against the Packers and one remaining against the Bears.

Any talk of a late season run and a stirring group of wins against some of the best teams in the NFL was all predicated on beating the Vikings on Sunday. After being besieged with Electoral College talk for the last month, there is a similarity between Mitt Romney’s plight last week and the Lions' plight heading forward.

Every single scenario that had Romney winning the election had him taking Ohio. It would have been nearly impossible for him to pick up enough electors without taking the Buckeye State. Well, the Vikings game was Ohio for the Lions. As we talked about scenarios and playoff possibilities, they all came with the assumption that the Lions would beat the Vikings in Minnesota. And if they can’t beat the Vikings in Minnesota, do we really expect them to beat the Packers in Green Bay? Do we really expect them to beat the Bears, Texans, Falcons and Packers at home? I suppose it’s possible. Just as it was possible that Romney was going to win California.

In other words – don’t bet on it.

Here’s another way to look at the Lions season and the unfulfilled expectations to this point. Through nine weeks of the season, who do you think is their MVP? Last year, you could have picked from Matthew Stafford, Calvin Johnson, Stephen Tulloch, Louis Delmas, Cliff Avril and others. This season, the list is a little shorter. Is it possible that a team can play nine games and NOT have an MVP? They have to give it somebody don’t they.

Stafford and Johnson remain the most likely candidates only because they continue to pile up gaudy numbers. But the stats don’t tell the story of what’s been a very uneven season. Again on Sunday, Stafford seems overmatched and rushed in the first half. The offensive game plan was scattered. The Vikings entered the game allowing more than 165 yards rushing in their previous four. And the Lions couldn’t seem to decide whether they wanted to feature Mikel Leshoure or Stafford. As a result, they featured neither and the offense scored just three points by halftime.

Nobody has an answer for why the Lions start games so slowly almost every week, but it should be clear by now that it’s no way to maintain sustained success. Perhaps Jim Schwartz needs to take a hard look at Scott Linehan in the off-season.

The Lions do have the second-best offense in the league in terms of yardage (406.1 yards per game.) But they’re also 13th in scoring average (24 points a game). 24 is an ironic number. That’s exactly where the Lions finished the game in Minnesota thanks to a second-half barrage. And yesterday’s game was a microcosm of the season. Too many mistakes. Slow start. Key penalties. And odd coaching decisions.

The Lions are most definitely not a playoff team. And other than a quarter here or a drive there, they haven’t played like it this season. There are still some high profile games to state their case heading down the stretch. But the Vikings are one of the teams that they’ll battle for the sixth playoff berth. And if the Lions aren’t as good as the Vikings, they sure aren’t good enough to even talk playoffs. And at 4-5 with seven games to go, they’re not.